Between the Bridge and the River (33 page)

As his money fell from his hands to the grave, he felt lighter and lighter. It seemed like the coins fell through the air slowly, and for a moment he felt he was back in the prison cell and was in the throes of a vision.

The money clanged against the cold stone and shook him into awakening. He felt his heart pump and a joy surged through his body.

It was the money.

The money and the privilege.

This was the source of his discomfort.

He turned to a ragged beggar who stood next to him at the shrine. The beggar, who had already noted with a thrill the fall of the money, was delighted when Francis suggested that they swap clothes.

Francis wanted to be dressed in rags. It made him feel holy. The beggar stole the money and ran off in his new suit before the mad aristocrat changed his mind.

Francis stood by the grave all day so that everyone could see how pious he had become. He was recognized by some natives of his home-town, who informed his family what he was up to. His father, exasperated by his son’s foolishness, had some of the men in his employ go to the tomb and grab the boy. He told them to try to beat some sense into the fool.

They did their best but Francis rejoiced at his suffering and in the end his father locked him up in an attic in the house. It was seen as shameful to have insanity in the family and it was the custom at the time to lock the mad away from sight lest the family fall into disrepute.

When his father was away on business, his mother allowed him to escape and he ran to the church for sanctuary.

When his father returned, he demanded his son come home but Francis told him he no longer was his son. He had a different father, one “who art in heaven,” and he would answer only to Him.

Francis worked among the poor, dressing wounds, tending the sick, distributing alms from the charitable, and offering solace to the
miserable and the dying by preaching the good news of the life that awaited them in heaven.

He was seen as a madman by his former friends, and when they encountered him in his rags in the street, they beat him and insulted him as they would have any other traitor to their kind. Francis wanted to help others, it was the only thing that made him feel good, but in his enthusiasm for doing good he sometimes got carried away, and in his desire to emulate the good carpenter of Nazareth, he occasionally fell into a mistaken zeal, which resulted in the sin of infallibility.

He was still tainted with the desire for victory.

As time passed and he did not falter from his marriage to Lady Poverty, he began to be seen by those who are looking for such things as a holyman. After all, he had given up everything to do the work of God, and surely that was better than someone who just did the work of God without having to give up a nice house and flashy velvet pantaloons.

People were no smarter in those days than they are today.

Francis became a celebrity.

He founded his own gang of holymen who had to dress in rags like him and help the poor; there was a separate order of women who did the same.

Things were fine for a while, then the old misery came back to him. Francis needed more pain. He whipped and starved his body but that didn’t do much good, so he gave it some thought and eventually he hit upon a scheme.

He elected to take only twelve of his followers, choosing the number to be just like Jesus (just because he had embraced poverty did not mean he had lost all ambition), and go to North Africa to convert the people of Islam to Christianity. This was at a time when the Muslims and Christians were locked in bloody and brutal war.

To embark on this mission was almost certain suicide.

Francis and his disciples boarded a ship and headed into the heart of the fray. They crossed stormy seas and were tossed onto a faraway shore. They walked south. In time, they reached a castle in the desert where Christian forces were being held siege by a vast Muslim army.

Francis fearlessly walked into the enemy camp carrying a wooden cross before him, his fanatic followers trudging behind, heads bowed, awaiting decapitation.

The Saracen soldiers could not believe what they were seeing; most thought it some kind of a joke, until a superior officer ordered his men to throw the monks in irons.

Word of the incursion by Christian fanatics reached the commander of the Islamic forces, the great Saladin. He ordered that Francis be brought before him.

Francis stood before the throne of the sultan.

“What do you want here, Holyman?” asked Saladin.

“I want you and your people to convert to the one true God,” said Francis.

Saladin laughed, his eyes crinkling at the corners, his teeth bright though his dark beard.

“We are converts to the one true God. There is but one God, Allah, and Mohammed is his prophet.”

“No,” said Francis. “God is God. The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

Saladin smiled. “Well, we can’t both be right.”

Francis was strident. “I know. I am right and you are an infidel. Turn to Christ or spend an eternity in hell.”

“Oh, come, come, priest. Enough fire and brimstone.” The sultan gestured to the silver pot and glasses in front of him. “Have some mint tea.”

Saladin’s guards glanced at one another, confused as to their leader’s hospitality to the prisoner.

Francis refused to sit and have tea. He began to mutter the Lord’s Prayer over and over again quietly to himself, in preparation for his execution.

Saladin walked up to him and clasped him on the shoulder.

“Priest,” he said, “you are brave and you are committed to your faith and both of these are admirable traits but you do me a disservice if you presume me stupid. You think I cannot see through your plan?”

Francis opened his eyes and faced the sultan.

The sultan stared at him intently. “You seek martyrdom, I understand. Sure passage to paradise and the praise of those who will follow.”

Francis said nothing.

Saladin continued, “But those who make martyrs are tyrants or fools or both, and I am neither. I am a soldier defending my homeland.”

“You are a heathen. An unbeliever,” stated Francis defiantly and without humor.

The sultan sighed deeply. “Yes, well, we’ll have to agree to disagree on that but here is what I am going to do with you, brave Christian. I am sending you home, under guard to protect your safety. My best soldiers will ensure that you reach your own armies unharmed, even if it puts their own lives in danger. It would be well if they were not martyred protecting you, history may frown on that no matter who wins.”

Francis was confused.

“I have enjoyed this, priest,” said Saladin, “but if you will excuse me I am very busy. May you die an old man in the company of your great-grandchildren.
Inshallah
.”

He snapped his fingers and Francis was led away.

Francis did not live to be an old man. He died at forty-five. It is said he suffered the stigmata, the wounds on his body imitating those inflicted on Christ.

This may be true, the wounds on Francis may have appeared due to the influence of a supernatural power.

Perhaps God’s finger touched him and he slept.

But there is one thing that all agree on.

He was not killed by a Muslim.

“
IN A PERFECT WORLD
,” said Roscoe, “you would have Chaplin as Francis and Valentino as Saladin, but who could ever afford that sort of casting, huh?”

Saul had been transported by Roscoe’s story. He had seen it as though it were a movie, a huge, magnificent epic where he could hear the thoughts of the actors and where the music on the sound track filled him with wonder. Another strange thing was that, in Saul’s head, the part of Francis was played by Chaplin and Saladin was played by Valentino.

He cast himself as the beggar at the tomb who stole the money and made off with the fine clothes, which of course was ridiculous because nothing that Chaplin wore would have fit him. Except perhaps the pants.

When he arrived at Sennett Studios in 1910, Chaplin had borrowed Fatty Arbuckle’s pants from wardrobe. He felt that the Little Tramp would look more comical in a pair of giant trousers that were obviously too big for him.

“Okay,” said Roscoe. “I gotta go, people to do, things to see, ha-ha.” He seemed to have cheered up considerably at the telling of a story.

“You look after yourself,” he said, putting his cap back on. “And here’s a tip. If you ever get out of that bed”—he leaned very close and whispered in Saul’s ear—”get the fuck out of Hollywoodland.”

And off he fucked.

Saul lay there for a while, trying to conjure up the story again, but it had left him. He became aware of an itch on his nose. He tried ignoring it but it got worse. He wished the nurse would come in and wipe his face, that would do it. The itch grew, it was torture, he couldn’t bear it, tears of despair rolled down his cheeks and from deep within his body a cry welled up and to his amazement he yelled, “Help!”

Then fainted at the sound of his own voice.

CRAWFORD’S CREEK HAD CHANGED OVER THE YEARS
. Where once there had been three churches, now there was only one.

The one true Church.

The Christian Reformed Fellowship of Born Again Snake Handling Pentecostal Baptists (Reformed).

The other churches had been boarded up, and slowly the vegetation of the forest began to creep over them, returning them to the dark mire from which they came.

The town itself had, in essence, died. When the interstate was built six miles to the west and the anthrax was found in the swamp, it seemed that no one wanted to live there anymore. When the young grew to maturity they moved away as quickly as they could, if they were lucky to a college, or if less fortunate they headed north to the plastics factories in St. Augustine. In time, the ones who didn’t run died off and were interred in the little churchyard in the woods.

All that remained were a few houses and the gas station that used to be the old truck stop where Saul and Leon had hitched their star to a wagon. Like many struggling businesses, the gas station had to diversify in order to survive. It got practically no passing trade because practically nobody passed, so they branched out to selling fireworks,
liquor, guns, hunting knives and clothing, ammunition, greeting cards, and baby clothes—and they stayed open twenty-four hours.

People came from miles around.

Not so for the one true Church. It did not have the savvy to diversify. It was tucked away in the clearing of the old battle site about a half-mile away from Main Street and it got no business from the town. The only people who lived there were the new owners of the gas station, the Gupta family, who had moved from Bangladesh to Florida in the mid-nineties, and they were Hindus. Snake handling was a bit too “out there” for them.

The lights were on in the Gupta gas station as the big RV rolled into town. Rasheed Gupta, the fifty-five-year-old patriarch of the Gupta clan, who always took the deadly quiet night shift, watched as the big camper rattled to a stop at the gas pump.

He watched the young black man get out, then felt under the counter and undid the safety clip that held his shotgun in place. He had never seen a young black man in a vehicle like this. It didn’t gel, it sent little warning pulses of fear through his system. He watched as another young black man got out and stretched, then a strange-looking white man in an orange dress, and a skeleton in a miniskirt.

He pulled the gun from its mooring and sat it on his lap.

T-Bo walked up to the bulletproof window and passed a twenty-dollar bill under the slot.

“Evening. Pump four.”

Rasheed nodded and took the money, glancing over at the freaks on the forecourt.

T-Bo turned and saw the others. “I told you guys to stay inside,” he growled in a stage whisper.

The others ignored him except Fraser, who called happily, “Remember to get chocolate biscuits.”

T-Bo turned back to Mr. Gupta and smiled. “We’re a band. Comedy troupe—musical comedy.”

Rasheed nodded slowly. “Okay,” he said.

“We’re looking to get to Birmingham, Alabama. We on the right road?” asked T-Bo.

“Oh no, sir,” said Rasheed, relieved the young man had asked him a question. It somehow made him seem less menacing. “You should be on the interstate, about six miles west. There is no traffic comes through this way.”

T-Bo nodded.

“This is Crawford’s Creek,” said Rasheed, like that should mean something.

T-Bo thanked him and bought the chocolate cookies that Fraser had insisted on. He gassed up the truck and rounded the others back inside. He admonished them for showing themselves. If there had been a cop around, he would have been bound to ask a weird-looking group like this some tough questions.

“They can’t put you in jail for the way you look,” said Fraser, munching his first Oreo.

“You haven’t been in the States long, have you, Padre?” said Cherry.

T-Bo had got the information he needed. There was nothing here to worry about and he could rest. He was exhausted and not one of the others was capable of driving. He pulled out of the gas station and headed down the road a few hundred yards past the boarded-up and ruined town. He turned down a lane and parked the camper in a little clearing in the forest. He turned out the lights and told everyone to get some sleep.

Potter Templeton woke them up.

He tapped the barrel of the big shotgun against the glass of the windshield. T-Bo opened his eyes, saw the gun, saw the face of the toothless hillbilly behind it, and knew they were in deep, deep shit. Potter marched them at gunpoint through the clearing. The croaking bullfrogs sounded like an angry and hostile crowd hidden just out of sight. He made T-Bo and Vermont carry the still-comatose Mickey Day, and he had Cherry and Fraser put their hands behind their heads like he had seen in a TV show years ago.

T-Bo, Cherry, and Vermont were terrified but Fraser seemed delighted with this turn of events, saying that Potter looked like his
uncle Jack on his mother’s side. Potter told him to shut the hell up and Fraser pouted at the brusque tone.